danthanol
07-09-2000, 09:04 AM
On GeForce cards:
What is v-sync? Is it better to have it on or off?
For DOS games:
What is conventional memory? Why is it usually 640 k? Old DOS games say that I don't have enough free conventional memory to play. Is there a way I can play these old games?
SysOpt
07-09-2000, 10:05 AM
v-sync synchonizes the frame rate with the refresh rate, when on. For example, if your monitor is running at a refresh of 75hz, and your graphics card is capable of generating 50fps at a particular res, vsync won't matter (it would only matter in that case at 75fps or highre). If your card is capable of generating 150 frames per second, though, and you turn vsync on, it will be limited to the number of frames per second that your monitor can display (75hz = 75 cycles per second), while turning it off will let it run at 150fps. Turning vsync off is usually used for benchmarking but you can experiment with both settings.
As for DOS, make sure your config.sys looks something like this:
device=himem.sys
device=emm386.exe RAM NOEMS
dos=high,umb
And make sure you don't have any needless drivers loading. Lets say you have a CD-ROM driver that you absolutely need and it looks like this:
device=cddriver.sys
Try changing it, and others, one at a time, to this:
devicehigh=cddriver.sys
That will load it into the "high" memory area, outside of 640k, and will free up some memory in the 640k block. 640k is simply the limitation imposed by the OS designers (i.e.- surely apps won't need THAT much memory! http://sysopt.earthweb.com/forum/smile.gif). There's also extended and expanded memory. Check this out:
http://sysopt.earthweb.com/memmax.html
Scott
[This message has been edited by SysOpt (edited 07-09-2000).]
danthanol
07-10-2000, 12:37 AM
Hey. Thanks for the information. I disabled v-sync and framerates are up. DOS games are no longer a trouble-shooting mess!
Dan